I worked my own Iron Chef recently when I was privileged to be a judge at the MGM’s annual in-house culinary competition. I tasted five dishes cooked by two teams, both finalists in a competition that began with a round of sixteen in a single elimination format.

Most of MGM’s top restaurants were in the first round, as well as venues such as the Mansion, Commissary and Room Service. In the final round, Diego, the hotel’s Mexican restaurant, did battle with the Grand Buffet. Who woulda thunk it?

My fellow judges included a VP of Engineering, MGM Grand President Scott Sibella and Joel Robuchon at the Mansion Chef Claude Le Tohic. (Joel Robuchon and Emeril’s were non-combatants this year.)

I go way back with MGM Executive Chef Christian Rassinoux, who I’ve known since the early eighties, and I was flattered he thought to bring me in. If you’ve never been in the Main Kitchen of a hotel this size, it is an eye opening experience.

There must have been ten thousand dollars worth of top drawer, boutique products on display, including glorious fruits and vegetables from ripe persimmons to preserved artichokes and organic licorice.

I’m amazed at food costs in a top quality hotel kitchen. Only the most exclusive privately owned restaurant would even dream of buying the stuff in this kitchen. And the ones that do probably don’t make money.

The competition was structured thus. Five chefs representing each venue were given 45 minutes to prepare four dishes representing a different decade, the 60’s through the 90’s. A fifth dish labeled the “bombshell”, would be made using a secret ingredient, which turned out to be fresh turbot.

While the chefs cooked, we watched, because the competition wasn’t judged on taste alone, but also on criteria like how well organized they were, and how much they wasted.

After the time bell rang, we sat for the tasting. Grand Buffet led off with a dish from the 80’s, a grilled scallop on greens with a Balsamic reduction. Team leader Marky Speak said it represented a time when American chefs were abandoning tradition.

A pared down Nicoise, sans tuna or anchovy, represented the 70’s, while a creative take Surf and Turf from the 60’s came next. The 90’s was chocolate lava cake, hot from the oven, invented by accident, or so says the urban legend, when Jean-Georges Vongerichten took his chocolate cake out of the oven too soon.

But the “bombshell” dish impressed me most, roasted turbot coiled artfully around a Santa Barbara prawn. It took all the discipline I had to save room for the dishes from Diego’s team.

That team was led by Chef Christina Olivarez, young, articulate and gifted in many ways. They led off with a dish from the 80’s as well, a “grunge” dish of butter poached shrimp with tomatoes, homage a the 80’s Master Chefs Puck, Trotter and Prudhomme, rebels all.

Shrimp and beef satay from the 90’s was followed by a food processor beef Wellington from the 70’s, which suffered from undercooked pastry and too much fat on the duck, which was used instead of beef. (If they called it duck Wellington, who would care?)

They then served their “bombshell” before their 60’s dessert, a fruit waffle that they claim came from the 1964 New York World’s Fair. The waffle at R Steaks, for the record, is more like the original. I liked their “bombshell”, broiled turbot with orange and walnut, but in the end, the one from Grand Buffet impressed us more.

Service and presentation, which included explanations from the team as to why their dishes were chosen, were also scored. Ultimately, the Grand Buffet was declared the winner. A huge cheer shook the kitchen when the result was announced.

The thing I personally took away from all this, besides the thousands of calories I consumed judging, was how incredible a talent pool there is in a hotel this size, and how many of these people are totally under the radar.

Celebrity like Michael Mina, Wolfgang Puck and Tom Colicchio bring them in, but the chefs in the trenches bring them back. Remember that next time you dine in at MGM Grand, or in any major Strip hotel.

I hope Chef Rassinoux invites me back next year.

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